The unrestrained hatred displayed by the Republic of Ireland towards the Jewish state was exposed last week when the Irish national football team, in concert with the Irish government and the larger public, demanded that the Israeli national football team be boycotted in the UEFA Nations League. When the Irish football team finally voted to play Israel, the Daily Mail quoted Ireland football boss Heimer Hallgrimsson as saying, “We are not playing with genocide, we are playing against genocide.”
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In one of the ugliest displays of disrespect, the Irish football team, its managers, and coaches lowered their heads as the Israeli national anthem was playing. Prior to the commencement of the games and, in a show of sportsmanship, team captains and referees generally meet to shake hands and exchange team pennants. The Irish captain refused to shake the Israeli team captain’s hand or exchange the traditional pennants. This behavior was unprecedented in the world of football.
One of the definitions of antisemitism is the use of “double standards.” One standard is applied to the Jewish state and another for the rest of the world. Enter the realm of sports. The Irish football team had no problem playing the Islamic Republic of Iran in 2002, without any controversy or boycott. They were playing a team whose regime has butchered thousands of its own people. The fanatical Islamist regime has been and continues to be the world’s leading sponsor of international terror- a regime that has one of the worst human rights records.
No other country in Europe has displayed such an unabashed hatred towards Israel as we are seeing with Ireland. This hypocritical and self-righteous state has used the war in Gaza to accuse Israel of having perpetrated “genocide” against the Palestinians in Gaza. A charge that is patently false by any objective standard.
The term genocide was invented in 1944 by a Polish-Jewish lawyer named Raphael Lemkin, who coined it in his book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe.
The key word, within the accepted international definition of genocide, is the intentionality of the perpetrator state to commit murder on an entire people or tribe. Nazi Germany intentionally planned to wipe out the Jewish people of Europe. They managed to murder Six Million innocent Jews, including one and a half million children.
Israel’s defensive war in Gaza was in response to the unprovoked Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) massacre of 1,200 (mostly) Israeli civilians, including babies, children, women, Holocaust survivors, and the elderly. Raping girls and women of all ages, these Hamas murderers proudly videotaped their “heroic” deeds for the world to see.
Israel’s actions in Gaza were aimed strictly at uniformed Hamas and PIJ soldiers. In fact, Israel and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) dropped leaflets and made phone calls to civilians informing them to move to safe zones. While the actual casualty numbers provided by Hamas’ Ministry of Health are subject to dispute, it is indisputable that Hamas forced many civilians to serve as human shields, thereby greatly increasing the casualty numbers. Additionally, many Hamas murderers dressed as civilians in order to further increase the number of dead. The high casualty count was a deliberate ploy to ensure that the antisemitic Europeans, such as the Irish, would be triggered to cry genocide.
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The factors that led the Irish to hate Israel and identify with the Palestinian Arabs are rooted first and foremost in their struggle for independence from Britain. Immediately after WW2, the Irish actually identified with the Jewish underground in pre-statehood Israel, who were fighting the British for independence. In later decades, however, the Irish Republican Army (IRA), joined the chorus of Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) supporters and held joint training with them in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley and in Libya. In more recent times, decreased religiosity and progressivism have completely erased any remaining sympathy the Irish once had towards the Zionist struggle for independence.
The Republic of Ireland is an exception in Europe. Throughout the continent, there are right-of-center parties who are more positively inclined towards Israel when it comes to taking sides on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Even in (hostile to Israel) Spain, there is a strong right-of-center opposition that leans favorably towards Israel. That is not the case in Ireland.
Influenced by the Soviet Union’s propaganda, which was meant to weaken the West with movements of decolonization, the radical IRA adopted the manifestly false Soviet interpretation of history, which defines Zionism as Western colonialism. Jews, not Arabs (who were the original colonialist-imperialist force in the 7th century CE), are the indigenous population of the Land of Israel. The Irish, however, adopted the Soviet version that characterized the Palestinian-Arabs as the natives of the land.
In July 2024, the Israeli government announced that it was closing its embassy in Ireland. Explaining the move, Israel’s ambassador to Dublin, Dana Erlich, said that “Ireland has taken a more extreme stance than any other country against Israel. Ireland has recognized a Palestinian state and recently backed South Africa’s action against Israel at the International Court of Justice, asking the court to “broaden its interpretation of what constitutes the commission of genocide by a state.” In other words, in their eagerness to condemn Israel, they are looking for a wider definition.
In December 2024, Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar declared that “The antisemitic actions and rhetoric that Ireland is taking against Israel are based on delegitimization and demonization of the Jewish state and on double standards.” Sa’ar added, “Ireland has crossed all red lines in its relationship with Israel.”
A decade and a half ago, Irish bed and breakfast proprietors banned Israeli passport holders. Now, a 2026 Bill passed in the Irish parliament prohibits the importation of goods originating in postal codes corresponding to Israeli settlements, as proscribed by order of the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade.
It is apparent that Irish hatred for Israel has metastasized into raw and ugly antisemitism.
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Image: AlmazUK via Flickr, CC BY 2.0.